As a veteran law-enforcement officer and feminist, I feel some relief that actual women and children might catch a break from being abused if men who want to rely on sexbots, rather than breathing human partners, can get them. Some relief – not much.

These realistic robots can be made to look however their demented makers desire. We have no laws requiring them to be crafted (and is this craft, akin to fermenting a fine mead or painting a great masterpiece?) so they don’t seem childlike; neither are there rules requiring anyone making them to do something – anything – to distinguish them as obviously not human. Therefore how often will police have to chase down allegations of child sex slaves, only to learn they’re “just” bots? Perhaps that’s an ultimate goal of the bot-makers and -buyers, to wear us out so they can go about their dirty work with no-one making pesky comments like “She’s 18? Prove it,” or “A dummy, really, maybe it’s you who thinks us cops are the fools!” When one man transmits to another a sexually transmitted disease via a bot party, or two men get into a fight over whose turn it is, the bot can’t very well be called as a witness against them.

Like “Shots fired!” calls on the Fourth of July that are “just” fireworks, there will be no end to the hurt feelings, fake sightings, possible (likely?) false arrests, and allegations that “The cops knew it was a sparkler/robot so why am I being arrested for M-80s/rape? Will a disgruntled party-goer, calling 911 to report forcible restrain despite knowing the “victim” isn’t real, still be charged with making a false report? Say a video of an apparent crime by an assailant is made by a concerned citizen. If it can’t be confirmed as a crime against a human rather than a lifelike robot, or if it indeed turns out to be a sexbot, will the man say “The cops should have known!” and file a lawsuit?

If a man can say he’s bonding with not just his motorcycle or boat or car but his bot, too, he will have zero incentive to reach common ground with any real women, not his half-sister, not his stepmother, not his bosses, certainly not his wife or girlfriend. But if he’s the abusive type anyway maybe women everywhere can heave a collective sigh of relief that she herself’s not the current or next target.

Asia and Europe already have brothels touting sexbots. Can America be far behind, and whatever will the evangelists say about that? “Morally repugnant,” because the object of the man’s attention is not his wife – or “Good, we don’t have to lock up the kids and sheep”?

The sexbots, at fifteen to fifty thousand dollars apiece, are not now restricted to those with physical disabilities and the elderly, however the bots might take the edge off. Will these items becoming more widely available just frustrate the remaining physically handicapped persons and emotional cripples (see below) who can’t afford droids, who will then take out their hostilities on their mothers and nieces, their roommates or students? Their children?

Several years ago one young man decided he’d waited long enough to get laid. Filmmaker Peter Rodger’s son Elliot went out hunting sorority girls as if they were rabid dogs and slew them. Will similar men, if bot-less and imagining themselves likewise unduly ignored or maligned, lash out and harm us further?

Maybe the world’s hostilities will devolve further. If getting a bot can be called something one freely chooses, there are myriad attendant, new, eternal vigilances we have to build up fast against them.

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About majaramirez

former assistant instructor in tai chi chu'an; current TreeKeeper (#467); former Master Gardener; member of American Bird Conservancy, Audubon, Fraternal Order of Police, and Mensa; career cop, now assigned as Warrant/Summons Officer at Branches 29 & 42; wife and mom.